đ á á âˇ
- Earth 01 - Earth as Substance
- Earth 02 - Places of Earth
- Earth 03 - Magic of Earth
- Earth 04 - Earth Personified
Earth Personified
Having explored Earth as substance, place, structure, and its magical dimensions, we now turn to the embodied element: Earth as a person.
Disclaimer - Gods of Earth
We will not be discussing
divinities of Earth with any great particularity. Our reader is likely
familiar with many, and if not, theyâve been introduced in previous
articles. We shall discuss the [gods] at length in their own article, but
suffice it to say that we do not consider covering Gaia, Hades, Tlalteuctli,
etc., to be any more helpful to writers than what has been covered in
previous entries of this series. The features of Earth in substance and form
should be sufficient to aid any writer in developing a deific persona or two
for their worldbuilding.
Creatures and Spirits of Earth
The notion of sprites being divided into discrete categories under the four elements originates in the works of Agrippa, and these categories are given names under Paracelsus in the four Sagani: Salamanders, Sylphs, Nymphs, and, relevant to this article, the Pygmy or Gnome.
While Paracelsus believed them to be actual physical people of a lineage other than Adam, who wore clothes, slept, and ate food, modern fantasy has gone a wildly different direction in the presentation of earth spirits.
We are not interested in dissecting the gulf between the peculiar beliefs of a 16th-century alchemist and modern pop fantasy, as we do not find the exercise insightful in itself. Furthermore, the conversation tempts aesthetic judgment that borders too closely to prescription for our liking.
Instead, we choose to dissect the common formulation of the Earth elemental, the Dwarf, negative synonym in the Goblin, and its counterpart in stature, the Giant. We limit our exploration to living, anthropomorphic spirits. The [dead] and various affiliated [animals] will be covered with more significant consideration in their own articles.
We know we just said we wouldnât cover animals specifically, but we can discuss some habits that storytellers can use to identify an elemental Earth orientation in living creatures.
Animals that crawl along the ground, such as vermin, move on their bellies or have many legs, are intuitively associated with the Earth. Similarly, ground-dwelling and flightless birds, quadrupeds that primarily forage on the ground, and bottom-feeding aquatic animals are also included. You may, yourself, deduce how these different animals and their habits express heaviness, stability, fecundity, darkness, and so on.
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| A Hippopotamus |
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| Two Dwarves from a Gjellerup's 1895 edition of the Peotic Edda, the poem VÜluspå. Art by Lorenz Frølich. |
Derived from either the congenitally gods-touched or perhaps ancestral memories of smaller hominids, dwarves are a universal of folklore the world over: human-like spirits with statures ranging from a foot or so smaller than average to genuinely diminutive. Their smaller stature gave them a clear perspective on what is beneath the notice of everyday people, lending them cleverness, cunning, and often magical powers.
On the positive side, they serve as guardians of what is precious. This might be vulgar riches, such as gold and jewels, or, as seen in the Egyptian god Bes, who was credited as the protector of pregnant women, infants, and children.
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| Relief of Bes next to the Roman north gate of the temple complex at Dendera, Egpyt. |
Dwarves, as chthonic spirits, are closely identified with the dead and the Underworld. Their habitation in tunnels and caves is indicative of secret knowledge of precious things. Intersecting with their cleverness, Dwarves are renowned for their exceptional skill in crafting metalwork and precious gems. Psychoanalysts link this subterranean habit with the unconscious mind. They are jealous hoarders and tellers of riddles, which always hint at their secret knowledge. Despite their cunning and suspicion, in folklore, they tend to be easily tricked and are soon parted from their handiwork. The foolish dimension of Dwarves often saw them placed in the role of Jester, the courtly inversion of the King.
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| Portrait of Perko of Heidelberg, famous 18th-century jester, by Johann Georg Dathan. |
Presently, the positive aspects of the Dwarf are expressed in the garden gnome, credited with a kindlier aspect and magical knowledge of the things of the earth.
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| A Garden Gnome |
We fear this section header may cause some confusion, as we are, in fact, still discussing Dwarves. More specifically, we are referring to the universally negative traits of the Dwarf, as exemplified by a well-recognized variation: the hideous Goblin.
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| John D. Batten's Goblin illustration from Joseph Jacob's English Fairy Tales (1890). |
Dwarves are oft characterized in folklore as miserly, mischievous, and malignant. They are dark spirits, as befits an Earth elemental, jealously guarding their secrets and coveting those of others. In Hindu iconography and elsewhere, they are cast as demonic, identifying their stature with stunted spiritual development and their lightless habitations with ignorance and the blindness of earthly passions. In Norse mythology, dwarves were born from maggots in the corpse of the Ur-giant Ymir, which suggests something of the esteem in which such spirits were held.
As mischievous and jealous creatures of the Earth, their mischief is deadly. Under the name âKobold,â they were said to haunt the mines of Germany, responsible for cave-ins and other disasters. During World War II, Dwarven saboteurs found humorous rebranding in the form of Gremlins, which were depicted as mischievous creatures that drank petrol and were blamed for numerous aviation disasters.
This cruelty and malice found expression across North America from coast to coast. In California, the Shoshone referred to them as Nynymbi, and in Delaware, the Wampanoag called them Pukwudgie. These evil dwarves shot at men with magical arrows, causing pulmonary embolism, tuberculosis, and a host of other conditions and diseases.
Evil dwarves also terrorized the home. The hob-goblin or boggart sowed fear and apprehension, especially in children, coming in through closets or down dark hallways to throttle them in their sleep.
Dwarves also exhibited surreal, anxiety-inducing anatomy. In Scotland, near Glen Aven, the demon Falin (sometimes synonymous with the Fachan) is a goblin with a head twice the size of its body, which portends certain death to the witness if seen before daybreak. In the Americas, the Curipira and the Duende were characterized by having backwards feet, one eye, large ears, or being thumbless (in any combination).
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| Tata Duende, the Dwarf of Belize. |
For storytellers, this anatomical distortion is of great significance, as the perversion of human features by enlargement, shrinking, twisting, or blending with the animal is a common indication of the demonic or destructive Chaos in the form of the topsy-turvy. Creatures with large, hooked noses sniff out what you hold precious. Their backward feet will lead you astray; those with big ears can hear your whispered words and their hidden secrets. Thumbless, they are an imitation of the human. One-eyed, they are born wrong or are otherwise asymmetrical. All of these indicate unwelcome and dangerous change.
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| Cormoran, a giant from the Cornish fairy tale Jack the Giant Killer. From the Flora Annie Steel version, illustration by Arthur Rackham. |
Towering behemoths, larger than life, the Giant is a fearsome, tyrannical brute that stands in contrast to the Dwarf. The Giant is, more often than not, aggressive, dim-witted, stupid, and clumsy. As an adversary to Man, the Giant serves as an anthropomorphic counterpart to the [Dragon]. This awesome potentiality must be overcome, for which the danger is great and the reward greater. The giant-slayer of these stories has the opportunity to manifest some of the virtues of the Dwarf, such as quick wit and perceptiveness, by taking advantage of that which is beneath the Giantâs notice.
The primary feature of the Giant is its size. While this may seem obvious, this is usually where readers and too many storytellers stop. The purpose behind their size needs to be laid out rather more explicitly: the Giant isnât just big, the Giant is bigger than you. Like the Earth, they are strong and stable, so they cannot be toppled.
Letâs examine the Jotun, the Giants of Norse mythology. They are broadly divided between the Frost Giants (Hrimthursar) and the Fire Giants (Eldjotnar). What did these stories convey to the audience? The forces of frost are bigger than you. The forces of fire are bigger than you. You cannot conquer such forces in the world by brute force or a strong constitution. The only way to survive the chill of winter and the danger of fire is by mindfully, humbly planning and navigating around them, because if you donât, frost and fire will crush you.
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| "The Giant with the Flaming Sword," a depiction of Surtr by John Charles Dollman for Geuerber's Myths of the Norsemen from the Eddas and Sagas (1909). |
In numerous cosmogonies, a war between the gods, representing the principles of Order, must be waged against the Giants, representing the principles of Chaos, to establish the world as we know it today. Here, there is an appreciation of these larger-than-life anima as primal to the world, older than the relative calm we enjoy, a more natural state of the constituent forces of the universe.
The abstractions represented by Giants may also be considerably more human. In the domestic context, the Giant is emblematic of parental tyranny, with the monstrous size of the giant hearkening back to a childâs perspective towards an abusive mother or father.
Consider also the Ogre: the man-eating Giant. The Ogre is a larger-than-life figure that consumes all they take and those who are sent to slay it. It is the foreign raider who takes your daughters to breed, slays your son, or sells them into slavery. He may be the bandit gang who absconds with the women of the village and makes a foul sport of their bodies. She may be the controlling mother-in-law who smothers your babies in the crib. These Giants are so structured that their terrible size is a consequence of their outsized malevolence, not the other way around.
The Giant, like the Dragon, is an emblem of potentiality; therefore, by its slaying, potential is realized in the form of riches and fertility. In the most popular version of Jack and the Beanstalk, Jack acquires a goose that lays golden eggs. Eggs are an unmistakable emblem of fertility, and the repeated laying is indicative of renewal and continued vitality, prioritizing the generation of wealth over its vulgar acquisition!
Considerations for Storytellers - Design
Design considerations largely follow our recommendations in the Goblin entry: the malformations of the Giant convey meaning. The giants of Greek myth were diverse in their anatomy. The Cyclopes were one-eyed, characterized by single-mindedness or a lack of foresight, as seen in Polyphemus. Argos Panoptes was a giant covered in eyes employed by Hera as a watchman. The Gigantes were often depicted with writhing snakes for legs and were said to threaten the gods, and it was Heracles who ultimately slew the lot.
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| Rell the Seer, as portrayed by Bernard Bresslaw in Krull (1983). |
The Cyclopes have been expanded in modern fiction, where their singular eye may be indicative of short-sightedness or a single-minded drive; conversely, it may also be indicative of the divine eye of wisdom (the âthird eyeâ), lending them the power of prophecy. We see this interpretation in Rell the Cyclops from Krull (1983), and in the expanded material for Paizoâs Golarion TTRPG setting in Pathfinder 1st edition. This identification with the divine insight may stem from a conflation with the wisdom of one-eyed Odin. It could also be an ironic twist on the short-sighted interpretation that doubles as a means to help distinguish the Cyclops from other forms of brutish Giants.
The eyes of Argos are emblematic of divine vigilance. Argosâs vigil did not end with his death at the hands of Hermes, but was instead perpetuated by Hera when she distributed his eyes to the peacock.
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| Pinturicchio â Io, Argus and Mercury (1492) |
The serpent-legs of the Gigantes are more instructive, identifying the guise of human shape as a deception, with the bastard-sons of Gaia seeking to pull the Ordered world back into the mire of Chaos.
The more fantastical the Giant, the more its form tells us. The Fachan of Scottish folklore is a truly malformed thing, having only one eye, one arm, one leg, and often only one ear. It wields a club in its one hand, so it can only destroy. With its one leg, it moves by hopping, meaning it never steps; it only stomps. With one eye, it sees only what it wants to see. With one ear, it only hears what it wants to hear. This is a monster that is dangerous to all and cannot be reasoned with. And, like destructive persons who cannot be reasoned with, it is wise to know where their stomping grounds are and give them a wide berth.
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| The Fachan, as interpreted by K. Francis Schales (1989). |
Considerations for Storytellers - Conflation
Giants are, obviously, an inversion of the dwarf in stature and often wit. We note, however, that in folklore, many malevolent dwarves possess the power to transform into giants and vice versa, which suggests that this is not a hard-and-fast rule. An enterprising storyteller may make excellent use of the features of Dwarf and Giant in the same creature, emblematic of outsized aggression, greed, appetite, or ego in a tiny, miserable, worm-like being. The true stature of such a thing constitutes a dark secret, whether it is the raging troll that appears large but is actually tiny, or the predator who feigns weakness to lull the unwary before devouring them.
Characters of Earth in Popular Fiction
Earthy characters in popular fiction have certain common design considerations. They tend to be big, strong, sturdy, emphasizing the qualities of dirt and stone as heavy and resilient things. They tend to be strong-headed, favoring direct action and brute force.
Weâll examine three examples that align with the most common interpretations of Earth in Character.
Our first example is Kongol, from the classic JRPG Legend of Dragoon (1999). Kongol is the last surviving member of the Gigantos tribe. Serving as a powerful foe to the party twice, he later joins them and is chosen by Golden Dragoon Spirit to wield the elemental power of Earth. He is huge and muscular, wielding massive axes. He speaks in simple, terse sentences. He is loyal, straightforward, and honest. He is uneducated but has a strong intuition and a well-developed sense of danger. His senses are stronger than those of the other humanoid races that compose the party.
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| Kongol |
Kongol embodies the obvious features and is modeled after the common form of Earth spirit, the Giant. His strength and resilience evoke stone. His straightforwardness lends him an air of mystery, an opacity derived counter-intuitively from his simplicity. He does not need to articulate himself because he acts. His loyalty reveals him to be as sure as stone. His strong senses connect him to the material in a way that the others donât, allowing him to pick up on things that are beneath the notice of others, despite his size.
Our second example is Kento of Hardrock, from the 1988 anime series Ronin Warriors, also known as Armor Legend Samurai Troopers (Yoroiden Samurai TorĹŤpÄ). Fan-favorite Kento is a stubborn, hot-tempered athlete, well-practiced in judo and kung fu, as well as being a rugby player and mountain climber. Consistently, Kento rushes into combat without thinking, relying on brute force, and his enemies have exploited his unwillingness or inability to properly consider the consequences to turn him against his friends. Despite this character flaw, he is fiercely loyal. He is armed with the Hardrock armor, which grants him the power of Earth, reinforcing his martial arts abilities with the resilience of stone and the force of earthquakes.
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| Kento of Hardrock |
Many of the features are consistent between Kongol and Kento: strength, resilience, stubbornness, and loyalty. However, Kentoâs manifestation of darkness isnât as narratively sophisticated as Kongolâs. Thereâs nothing mysterious in the simple opacity of Kento; heâs just thick sometimes.
Our third example is likely to be the most familiar to our readers: the Goron of The Legend of Zelda.
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| Darunia, King of the Gorons, The Legend of Zelda. |
This is not a singular person, but rather an entire culture and species, spanning multiple iterations of a franchise. While Kongol serves as a practical representative of a deceased ethnos, in The Legend of Zelda, we engage with that ethnos as a living culture and observe the commonalities between its members more directly.
The Goron are a physically strong Earth-elemental people. With no women (as far as the player can tell), they are believed to have been born directly from the Earth itself. Their diet consists of rocks. They vary in size from simply larger than Link to the size of mountains. They are round, with short, sturdy limbs, and can roll into a ball, allowing them to travel like a stone. They take great pride in their physical might and hearty constitutions, regularly challenging each other and strangers to feats of strength. Heavy creatures fear deep water because they are too heavy to swim. They place a high value on trust, as reliable as honest stone.
Between these three examples, the reader can see the common, even reflexive associations storytellers make when they express Earth through dramatis personae. Understanding these impulses is crucial to developing authentic, well-thought-out, and even novel interpretations of Earth as a character.
Alternative Takes on Earth-Inspired Characters
There is a preoccupation in storytelling with subversion that warrants examination before proceeding. Sometimes this subversion is employed for the sake of a gag, as seen in the high-pitched, squeaky voice of the earth-moving giant*, Pica, in One Piece.
*Compiler's Note: We are aware that Giants in One Piece are their own ethnic group, and that Pica is not a member of that group. Counterpoint: He's still gigantic.
Many (typically younger) storytellers employ subversion to capture attention and showcase their own cleverness. Unfortunately for them, some audiences are less inclined to be enamored of a cunning twist in presentation and view such choices as shallow and indicative of inexperience or insecurity. This sort of writing tends to distract the audience from the story because the storyteller is distracted by themselves. Unless it's a deliberate feature of storytelling, itâs rarely a good thing when the storyteller becomes the biggest obstacle to the story.
A further misfortune is that seasoned viewers and critics conflate the above with another sort of subversive writer: the inspired fan. Many young storytellers have been creatively invigorated by successful, narrative- and character-driven subversions of popular narrative tropes that are championed by the difficult-to-please audience. The gap between the honestly inexperienced storytellers and the abrasive elements of the consumer base is best bridged through mastery of the subject matter.
To that end, we examine the successful subversion of Earth-character tropes in one of the most lauded works of popular fiction of recent years: Avatar: The Last Airbender.
While failure is often the best teacher in the practice of a thing, more can be effectively learned about this subject by analyzing the phenomenal success of Toph Beifong, arguably the most popular character to emerge from ATLA.
Toph defies the standard model: sheâs a blind, twelve-year-old girl.
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| The best character in ATLA. Fight me. |
Despite this deviation from the norm, she fulfills every other condition stereotypically associated with the Earth-based character:
- Physically strong
- Tough
- Reliable
- Honest
- Loyal
- Strong-headed
- Stand-offish
- Favors brute force
- Perceptive of things her companions miss
But what if I told you that the choice to make Toph a blind little girl helped her characterize Earth better than the standard?
Tophâs youth suggests a frailty. This is compounded by normative considerations of her sex as physically weak and her handicap as debilitating. Toph is conceptually small as a feature of her intersectional categories.
Tophâs blindness, one of these categories that conceptually diminishes her, informs her sensory navigation of the world. She âseesâ through her feet via a well-developed tremor-sense, which allows her to observe what is beneath the notice of others, such as the impurities in iron and steel that enable her to metalbend. Further, under the logic of iconography, Tophâs blindness means every path she walks is one she navigates in darkness.
In short: Toph is a Dwarf!
But Tophâs Earth associations donât end there. Tophâs great strength, both in terms of her physical conditioning and mastery of earthbending, matches a rough, bombastic, larger-than-life personality. Toph is gigantic in terms of character and impact on the world.
The decision to portray Toph as a young blind girl, with all the presuppositions associated with those categories, allows Toph to play against type in a way that counterintuitively reveals and reifies type. The subversive character choice made in her creation enables her to leverage audience presupposition into the hypostatic manifestation of multiple Earth-related archetypes. Toph is 100% Dwarf and 100% Giant in all the ways that matter!
The Dangers of Subversion and the Elephant in the Room - the âGirlbossâ
Hereâs where our analysis may get
contentious. A common subversive character archetype in contemporary
storytelling is the âgirlboss,â apparently beloved of many storytellers and
despised by critical audiences.
Why take time in an article on elemental theming to discuss a politically charged topic?
We here at Damigeronâs Dungeon have a vested interest in the creative use of subversion as a powerful storytelling tool. Given we are currently in a Post-Post-Modern+ storytelling environment, a consequential segment of the audience is sensitized to common subversion methods and reacts to these choices as cheap gimmicks.
We find ourselves unable to disagree with this critical audience in many cases.
Subversion for the sake of subversion is poor motivation for a creative choice if not successfully integrated at multiple levels. Further, storytellers have an obligation to their story to tell it as effectively as they reasonably can. Employing a storytelling choice that a significant segment of the potential audience is already familiar with and tired of is irresponsible and unfair to your story, characters, and message.
As we do not have a better alternative venue to discuss the issue at present, nor a more compelling counterexample, it must be addressed here for the time being.
The Elephant in the Room - Toph and the âGirlbossâ
Disclaimer: Our concern here is with the features of the archetype, rather
than commenting on anything in contemporary gender politics.
The âgirlbossâ has the following relevant features:
- Female
- Hyper-competent
- Effortlessly out-compete men in their domains of mastery
- Able to physically overpower men many times their size
- Hostile, stand-offish, or condescending to others
- Hostile to traditional femininity
- Treated as a paragon of feminine strength
There is no denying that Toph appears to meet many of the above criteria. So why, then, do audiences critical of the âgirlbossâ so frequently point to Toph as an example of how to write a compelling female character?
The answer lies in world-building, competent characterization, and, most notably for this article, mastery of the Earth theming.
Consider, first, points 2 and 3. Toph is indeed hyper-competent as a bender, and effortlessly outcompetes men who have been training longer than she has been alive.
In Tophâs case, this isnât a sticking point because itâs informed by characterization: Toph is blind.
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| Toph, being blind. |
Because of her handicap, her parents tried to shelter her from the outside world. Unable to engage the social world of Earth-nation high society, her only domain of agency was the practice of earthbending. Earthbending was her whole world because there was nothing else for her to do. There is no one in the world more invested in the practice of earthbending than Toph, not even the elder masters of the art! Here, the thematic darkness of Earth, manifest in her blindness, feeds her mastery of the art of earthbending.
In the case of point 4, the world of Avatar employs a magic system that closely maps to the mind-body connection and physical conditioning, specifically in the form of martial arts. Given that earthbending is the magical domain of strength and stability. Everything in the world-building supports Tophâs ability to overpower almost any man physically. Hell, the show leads with this by revealing her competence and power through an underground professional wrestling persona, the Blind Bandit!
There isnât a good-faith critic who would be bothered seeing Toph wrestling a man to the ground, and it wouldnât even occur to most bad-faith critics to raise a stink. Thatâs how seamlessly integrated Tophâs characterization is with her element and Avatarâs world-building!
Itâs impossible to ignore that Toph is stand-offish, stubborn, hardheaded, and hostile, both generally (point 5) and towards traditional femininity (point 6). Unlike the critical perception of these traits in the âgirlboss,â which are one-dimensional and either inexplicable or only thinly supported, Tophâs manifestation of these traits is nuanced.
Toph is inherently a manifestation of Earth archetypes, so one dimension of these traits is a natural consequence of her temperament. If Toph could see, sheâd probably still be blunt, stubborn, hostile, etc. However, such characteristics would be tempered by or specifically adapted to the high-society world of the Beifong family.
Because Toph is blind, however, she is unable to engage an environment of appearances. She cannot see facial expressions, body language, colors, or the style of clothing. She cannot engage with the social world of seemings, with its attendant artifices, confabulations, unspoken rules, and even mutually agreed-upon deceptions and outright falsehoods.
Whether itâs fair or not to associate the traditional feminine with the petty intrigues of court, this is what Toph associates with the feminine. And sheâs not just hostile to it because itâs counter to her grounded temperament. It was a cage where she was excluded from participation passively by her blindness and actively by her parents.
So, Toph temperamentally leaned into features of her personality that were already present in a maladaptive, sour-grapes outlook, to insulate herself from the pain of rejection. This is never clearer than in episode 15 of Season 2, âThe Tales of Ba Sing Se,â where Toph allows herself to be vulnerable and undergo a makeover with Katara, only to be mocked by other girls passing by for the quality of her makeup. Part of Toph yearned to engage in the world of seeming in a traditionally feminine way, but she realizes that that social world is not for her. Toph is indeed handicapped, able to masterfully navigate the darkness in blindness, but never able to see the world of light, supremely gifted and severely handicapped all at once.
The critical assessment of the âgirlbossâ is that these traits are one-dimensional character flaws that a poorly constructed narrative and world present as virtues, based on considerations transparently external to the story. Toph, meanwhile, possesses these traits as multi-dimensional qualities that the narrative recognizes can be virtuous and maladaptive simultaneously. With this in mind, the storytellers of ATLA allow Toph to be a flawed, believable, relatable person, rather than a contrivance that's merely human-shaped.
Which brings us to point 7: Toph is not a paragon of feminine strength; she is a paragon of strength, transcending the boundaries of gender, period. Toph reveals that the most effective way to write a compelling, physically powerful female character is through subject mastery, quality characterization, deference to world-building, and respect for both the character's humanity and the audience's intelligence. Toph isnât a âgirlboss,â sheâs just a boss.
Weâre not done with Avatar and the Earth Nation, either. Moving on from a singular person, we examine how counterintuitive choices in group behaviors can help reveal under-explored dimensions of Earth-theming. For that, we point to the secret police of Ba Sing Se: the Dai Li.
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| The Dai Li |
The Dai Li is an intelligence organization that, much like the Praetorian Guard of Rome, serves as bodyguards to the Emperor of the Earth Nation. Rather than free-roaming spies like James Bond or Solid Snake, the Dai Li are creatures bound to the palace. Belonging to the espionage of institution, they operate in numbers from the shadows, socially, politically, and literally. Like the KGB, they black-bag even the most minor of disruptors to maintain opacity between the people, the throne, and the war effort against the Fire Nation.
They donât just walk through dark paths in the literal tunnels beneath the city, but darken the social interactions of everyone in the city with the looming threat of removal and disappearance.
This is a compelling narrative twist, as we, the audience, have come to associate the Earth Nation with reliability, honesty, and simplicity. The Dai Li, however, employ the deception of obfuscation; their web of secrecy and intrigue mirrors the opacity of complex matter (Earth).
This not only puts the audience on the back foot (in a good way), but also rounds out the humanity of the Earth Nation, elevating them above the merely reverentially oppressed or righteously resistant, but into a complex faction that resembles an actual human state and, consequently behaves like its populated by real people.
This demonstrates the multi-dimensional quality of elemental theming. Just because you've one character who manifests the element in a certain way, or have established a perception of an Earth faction with the audience, doesnât mean you canât provide an alternative presentation later or give contrasting depth to the perceptions youâve already established for your audience. You can work with the element to develop the world rather than letting what youâve already established become an obstacle.
Sample Earth-Inspired Characters
We would be remiss if we did not apply the lessons of this article to our own practice. To that end, we present four sample characters that draw inspiration from Earth in novel ways, in the hope that it might inspire readers in their own work.
ThorbjĂśrn Grundsson is a Viking and explorer of legendary repute. He is a great bear of a man: tall, broad-shouldered, and even broader of gut. Adorned with the bull-horned helmet and wielding a mighty maul, he strikes like thunder, and the earth shakes beneath him. In his many years, he knows a great many secret berths for raiding vessels, in caves and coves, where it is said his treasure stashes are stored. He has sailed from the mainland to the island many times, and he tells stories of crossing the sea to faraway lands where men wear animal skins and loose elf-shot.
His arrival, whether for trade or plunder, is both dreaded and eagerly anticipated, as significant change follows wherever he goes. Many a legendary figure got their start in his warherd or following in his wake, pursuing revenge.
Earthy Dimensions
ThorbjĂśrn meets all the standard
features of an Earth-inspired character in the form of a cartoon Viking. His
size and choice of weapon tell us he is physically strong, tough, and
direct.
His horned helmet (historically inaccurate for Norse raiders) evokes the bull as a totemic animal. The bull is a heavy, hooved quadruped, a ruminant, closely associated with the Earth. It is also the domesticated personification of thunder. ThorbjĂśrnâs weapon, the maul, is reminiscent of Thorâs hammer, another attribute of thunder. This lends ThorbjĂśrn the transcendent shaking force of earthquake (Earth) and thunder (lightning as celestial [Fire]). ThorbjĂśrn embodies both ends of the Elemental spectrum!
ThorbjĂśrn also knows secret ways and places, the berths for ships in sea caves and coves. No one alive but ThorbjĂśrn knows as many hidden sanctuaries from the storm and waves, and he remains tight-lipped on the subject. This is the navigational knowledge of the dwarf, but one that unfolds across the expanse of waters, the capture of winds, and the study of the stars. ThorbjĂśrn displays mastery of all four Elements!
The surface-level qualities of Earth inform ThorbjĂśrnâs personality, but he is an Elementally totalizing character. His Earthy personality reveals a hierarchical priority of the heaviest of the Elements as a dynamic feature. Internal to the narrative, his larger-than-life character catalyzes change in people, both positively and negatively; however, his thematic abstractions are a call to the storyteller to give the rest of the cast similar levels of thematic consideration to match his presence.
Lady Zhen is the widow of a wealthy merchant and a master of commerce in her own right. She has multiplied her late husbandâs fortune many times over thanks to her keen eyes and ears. She not only has an impeccable sense of the quality, quantity, and value of any goods she inspects, but also of the character of persons she deals with. Sheâs a quick study of the trustworthiness of business partners and their attendant risks and rewards.
Minimally literate, Lady Zhen can read a ledger at a glance but has neither the faculties nor the inclination for poetry or philosophy.
Thatâs not to say sheâs stupid. Not only is her mathematical proficiency worthy of a seat in the Imperial Treasury, but her cunning in market analysis borders on sorcery.
Lady Zhen is also well attuned to the movements of the criminal underworld, dipping her hand into the movement of contraband. Rather than directly involving herself in the activities of cartels, she positions herself as a bulk customer, supplying the highest-quality black market goods to the rich and powerful, thereby establishing herself as a trusted supplier. By maintaining a distance between the ruling houses and criminal organizations, sheâs able to keep potential competitors at bay and maintain her stranglehold on her wealthy and powerful customer base.
Earthy Dimensions
Lady Zhen knows the world. Her
supply networks span the globe, from one end to the other, or at least the
breadth of the world that matters.
Her intellectual temperament does not lead her to look up into the sky and wonder. Not for her are the abstractions of pretty words or thoughtful meditations. She is a woman of gross values, who prioritizes commerce in tangible things. Her concerns are not with the philosophical or moral implications of these things, but rather with how they move from one place to another, whether above ground (in the open market) or below (on the black market).
She not only knows how to navigate the secret paths of organized crime but also how to create her own, shadowed supply lines between petty criminals and the halls of power, navigable only by those bought and paid for with the gold from her overflowing coffers. She serves as the gateway guardian, acting as the organizational head.
Itâs from this comfortable seat that she reclines and directs the course of the kingdom with a simple transfer of coin (a device synonymous with the magicianâs instrument of earth, the [Pentagram]). In a profound sense, she is the ruler of her own world.
Kisirshapik is a cunning scribe employed in the court of the provincial governor. He is well-educated in the obscure art of cuneiform and is renowned for his mastery of the thousands of signs that comprise the reedy script. He is well-respected and often called to consult on scriptural interpretations in legal and spiritual matters.
This appearance of a respectable bureaucrat, however, is just that: an appearance.
Kisirshapik is a powerful sorcerer who works in clay. Using left-overs from his clay tablets, he can spread the clay over his features and mold his face to appear as another. One by one, he has removed professional and political rivals in the guise of other men. He commits other horrible crimes to sate his lurid appetites without threatening his esteem in the court of the governor.
His manipulations of clay do not end with his own features. None question when a scribe of his caliber orders loads of the finest clay. While he uses some for his clerical work, the bulk is reserved for the crafting of figures. Possessing his own kiln for preserving official documents, he fires hollow, sculpted images of man and beast. Once fired, he pours foul concoctions into their hollows off of wet tablets marked with incantations and curses.
With his rancid potions passed through magical spells, these likenesses spring to life and run out into the desert to carry out his will. It is by a lion and a scorpion so crafted that he has slain the sons of his governor, who called into question his counsel or made sport of his profession.
Earthy Dimensions
Kisirshapikâs administrative role
within the kingdom or empire in which he lives facilitates the governance of
the land (Earth). The medium of his record keeping and the platform for his
secret knowledge is clay (Earth). He is tasked with keeping permanent
records of the province's (Earth's) goings-on, using a confusing and obscure
scriptural system (darkness and secret ways). His mastery of his craft makes
him essential to the functioning of the government (Earth as foundation).
This position gives him an appearance that heâs able to manipulate
(opacity). He jealously guards his power from all who would challenge or
usurp it (guardian/murderer). His mastery of the medium enables him to
modify his appearance or create seemingly lifelike forms of man and animal
(malleability and deception of clay).
Kisirshapik is a strong manifestation of Earth as deceiver.
In life, Akhenkhamen was a sorcerer of the Pharaohâs court. He was the Pharaohâs half-brother by a serving girl and was sent to be educated by priests and scholars across the empire so that he might serve his half-brother as an advisor.
Growing to hold the Pharaoh in contempt, he maneuvered through the palace, positioning himself favorably through favors, blackmail, common murder, and sorcery. His plotting for the throne and his dark magics were revealed to the Pharaoh, and he was exiled into the desert, literally taken out into the wastes on a chariot and unceremoniously left to die in the sun and sand.
For three days, Akhenkhamen cursed his lot, cursed his brother, and cursed the empire he was denied. His body was covered with sand and desiccated, mummified by the desert. For three years, he was buried before the winds revealed his body, and he rose again.
Rejected by the afterlife and animated by a bottomless malice, Akhenkhamen stalks the edges of the Pharaohâs lands in a great storm of dust that blots out the sun. He lashes at the foundations of the empire with all the cruelty of the wastes, whipping up sandstorms to destroy crops and plunging whole provinces into famine. Those in Akhenkhamenâs path will be scoured bloody by wicked dust storms, and those close enough to gaze upon his shambling form are shriveled to mummies themselves, the sands of Akhenkhamen sapping the water straight out of their living bodies.
Earthy Dimensions
Akhenkhamen is a character who
walked dark paths in life, both magical and political. Deprived of rulership
over the empire (the world) and rejected by the afterlife (Earth in the
positive), he is doomed to walk the Earth as an instrument of the desertâs
contempt for the works of Man. He is shrouded in darkness, his storm
blotting out the sunâan attack on the Pharaohâs role as the representative
of the sun god Re. Like the sand he wields, Akhenkhamen embodies
instability, draining the lifeblood of civilizationâagriculture, just as he
drains the water from his direct victims. Those beyond his immediate reach
are buried in choking sands, bringing the humiliation of the wastes into
hearth and home, overturning the flimsy protections civilization
promises.
He cannot be approached easily because the scouring sandstorm he walks in casts all routes into darkness, rendering any quest to deal with him a journey into the Earth as a consequence. This is, iconographically, a march into Hell above ground.
* * * * * * *
- An Introduction to the Four Elements
- Quintessence
- Water [PENDING]
- Air [PENDING]
- Fire [PENDING]
- Gods and Principles [PENDING]
- Sprites and Spirits [PENDING]
- The Planets [PENDING]
- Macrocosm, Astrology, and the Zodiac [PENDING]
- The Structure of the Soul [PENDING]
* * * * * * *
-Drury, N. (2004). The Dictionary of the Esoteric: 3000 entries on the mystical and occult traditions. Motilal Banarsidass Publishers.
-Drury, N. (2005). The Watkins Dictionary of Magic: 3000 entries on the magical traditions. Watkins.
-Tresidder, J. (2008). The Watkins Dictionary of Symbols. Watkins.
[Img 01 - https://www.pinterest.com/pin/112449321915400248/ ]
[Img 02 - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Two_V%C3%B6lusp%C3%A1_Dwarves_by_Fr%C3%B8lich.jpg ]
[Img 03 - https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Dendera_Bes_01.JPG ]
[Img 05 - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Gardengnome.jpg ]
[Img 06 - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Goblin_illustration_from_19th_century.png ]
[Img 07 - https://bedrocktobelize.com/tata-duende/ ]
[Img 08 - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Cormoran_-_Project_Gutenberg_eText_17034.jpg ]
[Img 09 - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:The_giant_with_the_flaming_sword_by_Dollman.jpg ]
[Img 10 - https://www.pinterest.com/pin/54395107976819585/ ]
[Img 11 - https://www.pinterest.com/pin/433823376610173117/ ]
[Img 12 - https://www.pinterest.com/pin/652810908508208178/ ]
[Img 13 - https://www.pinterest.com/pin/5277724542224868/ ]
[Img 14 - https://www.pinterest.com/pin/320037117290143943/ ]
[Img 15 - https://www.pinterest.com/pin/2040762327339216/ ]
[Img 16 - https://characters.fandom.com/wiki/Toph_Beifong ]
[Img 17 - https://tenor.com/view/avatar-toph-blind-gif-5704551 ]
[Img 18 - https://www.pinterest.com/pin/154811305911018462/ ]
[Img 19 - Google Gemini ]
[Img 20 - Google Gemini ]
[Img 21 - Google Gemini ]
[Img 22 - Google Gemini ]
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